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Cat the Most selfish Women in all the seven Kingdoms


1northlad

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@My Sun and Stars I don't think you are allowed to post show information in the book forum, not even under spoiler tags. 

To the OP, Cat is far from being the most selfish woman in Westeros. She's a mother and a wife whose family is attacked and she does everything to protect them. Cat is definitely proud but that comes from being raised the daughter of a high lord and being Hoster's heir before Edmure was born. Cat also may have an exaggerated sense of her acumen and intelligence and she tends to be impulsive at times. As to her dislike of Jon, it is understandable although I did feel she erred in directing her anger towards Jon rather than Ned. Her fear of Jon usurping her children's rights should have abated once she saw Jon's devotion and love for his siblings and family but unfortunately it didn't. I really was annoyed with her in regards to her conversation with Robb about naming his successor. I don't mind that she wanted Robb to name one of his true born siblings his heirs but I was annoyed that she wanted to name some random cousin from the Vale his heir instead of Jon, or that she compares Jon to Theon. As Robb said that was unfair and cruel of her. And in AGOT, I always felt it was her ambition that caused her to convince a reluctant Ned to take the Handship and agree to Sansa's marriage with Joffrey. But no, I don't think  Cat is anymore selfish than any other mother when it comes to the interest of her children or family. 

 

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4 hours ago, My Sun and Stars said:

I've always hated Cat, and get so annoyed that we are in the minority it seems. Obviously if my husband brought home a baby that wasn't mine, it would be inconceivably difficult but at the end of the day I think most compassionate human beings can accept the fact that this is a blameless child. Not saying she needed to love him, but even neutral indifference like she showed toward someone like Theon is worlds better than the outright cruelty she has shown to Jon on multiple occasions. 

The minority? Somehow I doubt that, she is certainly disliked by the majority of people I talk to. I don't hate any characters that I find interesting no matter whether they go against what I want them to do or not. And she certainly did that. I find her believable and enjoyed reading her chapters including her contrasting point of view.

If your husband brought home a bastard son it is very good that you think you would treat the child kindly. It is a character flaw that she doesn't. Would you want your own children to be more successful and get worried if the bastard was gifted? Or if your husband died and the bastard could possibly inherit all of your money? Although those examples are unlikely with Jon there were other ASOIAF examples (and in real world history) where bastards could cause genuine problems and even harm the other children.

It didn't help that Ned handled the situation very badly. I personally think he needed to tell her the truth and then I think she would have been OK and could be trusted to keep the secret. On the other hand it would be a risk from Neds point of view.

As an aside I think her defining moment will be her redemption. I think she will sacrifice herself and be the one to bring Jon back to life, putting aside her hatred and distrust of him to follow Robb's last order and crown him the King in the North.

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17 hours ago, 1northlad said:

So I am re-reading through the books. ( Or is truly honest im listening to them as I drive to work. But have read them before) and as much as I love the Catlyn Chapters I hate Cat herself. the chapters are good because you get to see the war through the Northern and Rivermen's eyes and it actually feels like a proper war story with troop movements discussed etc. but Cat ruins them. all she thinks about is herself!! 

Every time she has a go at Edmure for trying to re-capture Jamie, Every time she has calls the men around her stupid for not understanding her feeling on why she let Jamie free. then she has the audacity to berate Robb about his new wife. She refuses all his orders throughout the series bar going to see renly and Stannis inadvertently and fails, though not much she could do admittedly. I know she was grieving but come on. the shit she did was treason, letting the KINGSLAYER go was the most selfish thing anybody has done in this series.  

All she does is moan and hinder Robb at every turn until Roose Bolton finally does his one good deed and ends her miserable existence.

So does anybody agree with me, that Cat is Boring to read and the most selfish Woman in the books? 

I'm not as interested in the war story, so I don't see Catelyn as a disruption of that information. The author does give us a conversation where Catelyn and Brienne compare women bearing and raising children to the heroic efforts of men in battle:

"Knights die in battle," Catelyn reminded her.
Brienne looked at her with those blue and beautiful eyes. "As ladies die in childbed. No one sings songs about them."
"Children are a battle of a different sort." Catelyn started across the yard. "A battle without banners or warhorns, but no less fierce. Carrying a child, bringing it into the world . . . your mother will have told you of the pain . . ." (ACoK, Catelyn VI)
 
So the juxtaposition of the battle and the women thinking about their lives is deliberate and, in my opinion, appropriate. The author wants us to think of Catelyn "battling" for her children as fiercely as the men (+ Maege Mormont) are battling for their king.
 
Catelyn is not the only one in conflict with Edmure. Robb has also criticized Edmure, for ruining the chance to destroy Tywin's army. A pretty big deal. Edmure is a complete screw-up, from what the author conveys to us. 
 
As for "berating" Robb about his marriage - Catelyn is the one who put to use her family relationship with the Freys and negotiated the alliance that allowed Robb to cross at the Twins and make some major advances in his war. Not exactly hindering him, don't you think? I don't think she berates him, but she is very disappointed that Robb agreed to the Frey alliance with all its terms and then reneged. She knows there will be hell to pay for breaking the promise to Walder Frey. Here Robb has undermined his own strategic interests. I see Robb as a know-it-all punk who likes the idea of being king and getting attention and praise from his father's friends. Catelyn has the right to be upset.
 
As for "the most selfish thing anybody has done in this series," I think you can't condemn Catelyn so harshly unless you put Jorah Mormont in the same category. His spying on Daenerys was also treason - including the fact that King Robert ordered a hit on Dany when Ser Jorah reported that she was pregnant - and he did it because he hoped to be pardoned for another crime he committed earlier. Similarly, Littlefinger commits treason by spiriting the valuable hostage Sansa Stark out of King's Landing. If he also helped to kill Joffrey, I'd say that's pretty major regicide treason and even more selfish than Catelyn because he wasn't even trying to protect his family.
 
Catelyn gets it coming and going - people blame her for "starting" the war because she took Tyrion prisoner. No one seems to blame Jaime for pushing Bran out the window. And then they blame Catelyn for freeing Jaime. She is condemned for both imprisoning and freeing Lannisters. No way to win.
 
Catelyn, Lysa and Cersei are not my favorites, but I think they are getting unfair condemnation while a lot of similarly selfish and treasonous male characters are being given a free pass.
 
But the larger point may be that all of GRRM's characters are grey - no one deserves all condemnation and no one deserves all praise.
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1 hour ago, SeanF said:

It warms my heart to see the return of a Catelyn the Monster thread.  We haven't had one of those for some time.

She like totally deserves it! She was like totally not totally not cool towards Jon who is like totally cool and hawt!!!!11

She who dares not to cuddle the Emo Prince With Mysterious But 100% Royal Parentage and Who is Too Sexy When He Broods is an Evil! and Fat! and Ugly! woman!

:D

 

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12 minutes ago, Grazdan zo Azer said:

I really want to know what the people in this thread will do if their husband/wife brings son to live together after being separated for one year.

 

The only defence for Ned would be that he and Cat weren't meant to marry. She was betrothed to Brandon. The impression I got from Catelyn was that the early days of her marriage to Ned were awkward, as neither Ned or Catelyn were intended for one another and that Ned and Brandon were two completely different people. Brandon, big, straping confident and Ned smaller and solemn. The first day that Ned and Catelyn even met each other was their wedding day.

Catelyn and Ned conceived Robb on their wedding night then after a fortnight, he went off to war, so if Ned had been with another women during the war, it would have been at the very beginning of an awkward marriage. I am sure neither Catelyn or Ned actually loved the other at the point Ned went to war. It was after he came back from war that they actually got to know each other and finally fall in love.

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33 minutes ago, Grazdan zo Azer said:

I really want to know what the people in this thread will do if their husband/wife brings son to live together after being separated for one year.

 

Exactly.

Plus, they weren't even separated! Ned was off to fight in a war. So the closer analogy would be the partner bringing a child home after a long business trip/tour of duty.

8 hours ago, Seams said:
 
So the juxtaposition of the battle and the women thinking about their lives is deliberate and, in my opinion, appropriate. The author wants us to think of Catelyn "battling" for her children as fiercely as the men (+ Maege Mormont) are battling for their king.

.

I agree very much. I found Robb's cause pretty unsympathetic, so I enjoyed Cat's arc, her helplessness to safe her children much more interesting and relatable. 

I also find it very, very, interesting that Cat gets called "selfish" for freeing Jaime to safe her daughters, but Robb doesn't get called selfish for refusing to exchange Jaime for Sansa (and as far as he and Catelyn knew, Arya). He left his sisters as prisoners of war to his enemies!

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She isn't selfish, she thinks of her family. How to free her daughters, who nobody cares about much because they are female. Her personal tragedies, like her dead husband and Bran's crippling, Bran, who she left when she went south. Her own guilt, because her actions escalated the war, because she left Bran and because she convinced Ned of going south. She might think of herself a lot, but not for selfish reasons.

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Cat Tully is not that different to Cersei. They are both fiercely protective to their cubs, they have this crazy mentality that they think they know best (ex arming the faith militants or allowing Jamie to flee), they do say that they love their loved ones but wouldn’t hesitate one moment to throw them down the bridge if they need to (ie putting her husband in trouble by arresting Tyrion or by convincing Jamie to join the KG), they just love to toy with people (LF and Lancel) and live dangerously (Cersei had sex with Jamie right at Robert’s nose, Cat flirted with LF knowing fully well that he could come to her chambers and rape her). What Cat did to LF (ie drive him crazy enough to challenge Brandon to a duel) could have easily been achieved by Cersei if somehow Jamie learnt the truth about what his cousin did.  


That comes with no surprise. They are both stunning, of the same generation, of equal nobility standing, who were basically neighbours (CR and Riverrun is not that far away) and who have lost their mother at a relatively young age. Both Hoster and Tywin loved the game of thrones and were willing to use his own daughters as pawns to achieve it. That must have made them feel special, boosting their ego to dangerous levels. Tywin could have never managed to put a blondie on the IT without Cersei. Hoster could have never been able to convince the far more powerful warden of the North to bail his crappy land out without Cat. That is why both hated Ned/Robert bastards. They reminded them that they were just cows to breed, nothing more, nothing less.

The big difference between the two girls lied in their respective husbands. Ned was always in control.  Ned’s bloodline was way more prestigious than that of a Tully. The North was also far more powerful than the Riverlands and the latter needed the former more than the former needed the latter. Things aren’t as straightforward with Robert. Sure Bob is king, but his family originated from some bastard who took a naked lady as wife. In a 1 to 1 fight his ancestral home would lose out against the Westerlands + Bob was so in debt to Tywin that the boundaries between Lord and King was somehow blurred. That made Cersei feel that she was somehow more powerful than she actually was. 
 

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3 hours ago, JordanJH1993 said:

The only defence for Ned would be that he and Cat weren't meant to marry. She was betrothed to Brandon. The impression I got from Catelyn was that the early days of her marriage to Ned were awkward, as neither Ned or Catelyn were intended for one another and that Ned and Brandon were two completely different people. Brandon, big, straping confident and Ned smaller and solemn. The first day that Ned and Catelyn even met each other was their wedding day.

Catelyn and Ned conceived Robb on their wedding night then after a fortnight, he went off to war, so if Ned had been with another women during the war, it would have been at the very beginning of an awkward marriage. I am sure neither Catelyn or Ned actually loved the other at the point Ned went to war. It was after he came back from war that they actually got to know each other and finally fall in love.

to add that, wasnt catelyn was annoyed by the idea of ned bringing jon to winterfell with him and treating him almost as good as his trueborn kids? if i remember correct when she was thinking about the whole bastard thing she was ok with ned being with another woman cos he was away and at war and its not uncommon for men to be with other women and even have bastards

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2 hours ago, devilish said:

Cat Tully is not that different to Cersei. They are both fiercely protective to their cubs

This couldn't be less true.  Catelyn loves her children.  Cersei loves herself, and sees her kids as an extension of herself.  How many times does Cersei express pride in her children, or joy at their accomplishments?  She calls Myrcella pretty, which is about as nice as it gets.

2 hours ago, devilish said:

they have this crazy mentality that they think they know best (ex arming the faith militants or allowing Jamie to flee)

Of course, motivations matter, as do results.  Cersei has no idea why what she's doing could be stupid, and is blithely dismissive of claims to the contrary.  Catelyn is making a hard choice in an attempt to save her family.  Bad decision?  Sure.  But reasons matter.  Plus, Cat's decision will end up helping her girls, whereas Cersei's has done a lot to erode her own power.

And FYI she didn't allow Jaime to "flee".  She sent him off as a prisoner, as part of a prisoner exchange.

2 hours ago, devilish said:

they do say that they love their loved ones but wouldn’t hesitate one moment to throw them down the bridge if they need to (ie putting her husband in trouble by arresting Tyrion or by convincing Jamie to join the KG)

Ned is well aware of what Cat is doing, seeing as they have a long conversation about it in Kings Landing.  And these two things are, again, not equivalent.  Ned and Catelyn agree that the Lannisters are traitors, and have tried to murder their son.  They actually have a fair bit of evidence (some of it deliberately falsified) of this.  Whatever else she is doing, Catelyn believes she is exacting justice on a guilty party.  Cersei is acting purely selfishly - ruining Jaime's future for the chance at being near him (when she was willing to abandon him in a heartbeat for Rhaegar, recall).

2 hours ago, devilish said:

they just love to toy with people (LF and Lancel)

Ummm... where do we get ANY evidence that Catelyn "toyed" with Petyr?  His own recollections, which are, as you'll recall, quite often wrong.  Why are you taking the most biased possible source as gospel?  Cat seems to consider Petyr a friend, and acting friendly is not the same as toying with someone, or "asking for it", however the guy might interpret it.

2 hours ago, devilish said:

nd live dangerously (Cersei had sex with Jamie right at Robert’s nose, Cat flirted with LF knowing fully well that he could come to her chambers and rape her)

It is absolutely obscene that you find a parallel here.  Cersei is not only cuckolding her husband while in the same room, she is committing treason, an offense punishable by death, with her own brother.  Catelyn is guilty of flirting with someone, at worst.  Are you being serious in considering these equally morally reprehensible?

2 hours ago, devilish said:

What Cat did to LF (ie drive him crazy enough to challenge Brandon to a duel)

We have zero evidence she did anything of the sort.  Littlefinger remembers having sex with Lysa as having sex with Catelyn.  That's the extent of her "driving him crazy". 

2 hours ago, devilish said:

Hoster could have never been able to convince the far more powerful warden of the North to bail his crappy land out without Cat.

You really don't understand the politics involved, it seems.  It is Rickard Stark who is eager for the alliance, and then Ned/Jon Arryn, not Hoster.  Hoster Tully has the upper hand, which is why when Brandon dies, his price (in terms of his alleigance) goes from marrying Cat off, to marrying her AND "soiled-goods" Lysa as well, to the eventual #2 guy in the realm.

2 hours ago, devilish said:

That is why both hated Ned/Robert bastards. They reminded them that they were just cows to breed, nothing more, nothing less.

Catelyn hates Jon because he is a direct threat to her children.  She doesn't resent him because he's alive, she resents him because he's in Winterfell.  He's older than her kids, looks more like a Stark, and Ned is making a political statement by allowing him to live in Winterfell and not off in some random place.Likewise,Cersei never expresses hatred for Robert's bastards.  She hates Robert for being a lecherous drunk, but not his kids.  She has Robert's bastards killed because they have better claims to the throne than her own kids, not because she has some perverse hatred of them.

3 hours ago, devilish said:

The North was also far more powerful than the Riverlands and the latter needed the former more than the former needed the latter.

Again, this is explicitly not true, especially at the time of the marriage.

3 hours ago, devilish said:

n a 1 to 1 fight his ancestral home would lose out against the Westerlands

Fine, but in a 4 on 1 fight he would have won handily.  Which is what it was (Stormlands/North/Riverlands/Vale).

3 hours ago, devilish said:

Bob was so in debt to Tywin that the boundaries between Lord and King was somehow blurred.

Not when he married Cersei, he wasn't.

3 hours ago, devilish said:

That made Cersei feel that she was somehow more powerful than she actually was. 

What made Cersei feel powerful was that Robert was a lazy idiot who couldn't be bothered with the day to day of running a kingdom, or dispensing of patronage properly, which means Cersei got the opportunity to put her supporters in power, which means she was quite powerful.  Feudalism is about proximity to the person of the king, and as Robert himself says, he's surrounded by Lannisters.

In a nutshell, you are wrong about nearly every single assertion you make in that post.  The places you aren't wrong, you are being disgustingly and disturbingly misogynistic.  All the words that aren't factually or logically incorrect, or asserting that the woman in question could be raped for expressing affection for a foster brother, are essentially just articles and pronouns.

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On 8/21/2017 at 5:10 AM, 1northlad said:

So does anybody agree with me, that Cat is Boring to read and the most selfish Woman in the books? 

No, I do not.  She is in the top three but Cersei is at the top of the list, followed closely by Sansa.

Most Selfish Women in the books are (1) Cersei, (2) Sansa, (3) Catelyn, (4) Arya, and (5) Lyanna.

1)  Cersei.  For obvious reasons.

2)  Sansa.  Lied about Micah and the direwolves.  Partly responsible for getting Micah and Lady killed.

3)  Catelyn.  Kidnaps Tyrion.  Released Jaime from captivity.

4) Arya.  Deranged killer.  She murdered people under the pretense of justice. 

5) Lyanna.  Ran away from a sworn engagement and placed her own happiness ahead of the welfare of the many. 

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On 8/21/2017 at 8:04 AM, Ser Petyr Parker said:

I forgot about Jon. It's hard to excuse that.

Catelyn never mistreated Jon, Ned wouldn't have let it happen anyways. She just never warmed up to Jon and kept him at a distance. She said she didn't have a problem with Ned fathering a child with another woman, but resented the child growing up in front of her in the castle. 

While this view is by no means justified, considering the society they lived in, it is at least understandable. And Ned's reluctance to talk about Jon's mother made things worse.

Cat's dislike of Jon was irrational, but human beings are often irrational.

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3 hours ago, Helen of Troy said:

No, I do not.  She is in the top three but Cersei is at the top of the list, followed closely by Sansa.

Most Selfish Women in the books are (1) Cersei, (2) Sansa, (3) Catelyn, (4) Arya, and (5) Lyanna.

1)  Cersei.  For obvious reasons.

2)  Sansa.  Lied about Micah and the direwolves.  Partly responsible for getting Micah and Lady killed.

3)  Catelyn.  Kidnaps Tyrion.  Released Jaime from captivity.

4) Arya.  Deranged killer.  She murdered people under the pretense of justice. 

5) Lyanna.  Ran away from a sworn engagement and placed her own happiness ahead of the welfare of the many. 

1) Agreed.

2) A child. 

3) A mother acting on bad information on the first, and in desperation in the second. 

4) A traumatized child who's been roped into a death cult.

5) Blatant assumption based on facts not in evidence. As far as we know the girl was kidnapped. Nothing in the text indicates otherwise at this point.

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12 hours ago, devilish said:

Cat Tully is not that different to Cersei.
 

Their intense care for their children is about where the similarity ends. Beyond that I'm not sure you could find two characters more opposed.

Cersei is obsessed with her own personal power and status. Her attachments to other people are based entirely on their ability to validate her narcissism. She makes rash, drunken decisions with terrible consequences. She manipulates and coerces people to do her bidding, knowing they'll be hurt or killed. Only Littlefinger might have more clinical symptoms of psychopathy, and he's certainly less reckless about it.

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11 minutes ago, Lady Blizzardborn said:

5) Blatant assumption based on facts not in evidence. As far as we know the girl was kidnapped. Nothing in the text indicates otherwise at this point.

Even if we do assume the legitimacy of R+L (which I do), it's hardly an act of "selfishness" to avoid one's own lifelong misery. It's strongly hinted at that she really wasn't into  the marriage and knew she'd just be put on the shelf as soon as the wedding was over. She basically would have been Robert's concubine, just like Cersei was. Robert treated Cersei not so different than Drogo treated Dany at the outset of their marriage - would we call Dany selfish for wanting to escape her arranged marriage?
 

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1 minute ago, cgrav said:

Even if we do assume the legitimacy of R+L (which I do), it's hardly an act of "selfishness" to avoid one's own lifelong misery. It's strongly hinted at that she really wasn't into  the marriage and knew she'd just be put on the shelf as soon as the wedding was over. She basically would have been Robert's concubine, just like Cersei was. Robert treated Cersei not so different than Drogo treated Dany at the outset of their marriage - would we call Dany selfish for wanting to escape her arranged marriage?
 

Also a good point. I'm guessing the selfishness claim stems not only from the idea that Lyanna was willing (something we don't know) but also from the misconception that Rhaegar's carrying her off started the war. Though I could be wrong.

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No the most self fish and annoying female character will always be cersi. I thought cersi would be this great mastermind, but reading feast she was an idiot and did such selfish things it boggles me. The whole Tommen can wait let me rule poorly, arm the faith, alienate my allies and family i mean seriously?? I was so disappointed in her shame shame shame 

 

Cat i do agree some of the best written chapters but she was annoying and selfish much like sansa was. 

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